Kaboom is a weird movie. It is unconcerned with traditional cinematic storytelling. With a punk rock/post-modern energy, it deconstructs the average teenager film into some crazy, hypersexual, apocalyptic hallucination. The results are a lot less cool than they sound, and for all of the effort my mind was not blown.
Smith (Thomas Dekker) is a broody 18 year old college student experiencing a sexual awakening. Not burdened by shyness, Smith does it with both boys and girls. He has a lippy best friend named Stella (Haley Bennett) and a bimbo roommate named Thor (Chris Zylka.) They talk in pop-culture references, go to parties, and obsess about blowjobs and clit stimulation. Nothing too strange about that.
The weirdness begins in Smith’s dreams, but soon his dreams start bleeding into his real life. One night he thinks he witnesses a murder, only the perpetrators are men in black suits and animal masks. Smith follows the trail, doubting his own sanity, and encounters mysterious characters connected to a dangerous cult. The crazy doesn’t stop there. Oh no.
See Stella is dating a witch with supernatural powers, which would be a good thing if the girl wasn’t so clingy. Breaking up means piercing voodoo doll headaches and demonic possession. The psycho lesbian isn’t the only one with supernatural powers, and Smith must race to uncover the truth about the strangeness around him before the conspiracy threatens to destroy everyone he cares about.
I don’t think the connection has been made yet, but I noticed a lot of similarities between the cult depicted in the film and the infamous Family International cult founded in the 1960’s by sick f--- David Berg. Secrecy, extreme sexual freedom, the supernatural, prophecy, child abuse/abduction, end time theories and incest were all institutionalized by Berg and The Family.
Ricky Rodriguez was born into the cult, raised as the heir to Berg and idolized by all other members. Grown, he helped bring to light all of The Family’s abuses, and sadly, took his own life. His story was depicted in an MSNBC special and it really affected me.
If writer/director Gregg Araki purposefully wove a fictionalized version of The Family cult into Kaboom, he failed in providing the average viewer with a significant tell. Either way, I believe the real-life story is too important not to mention in this review.
Aside from the possibility of a meaningful analogy, the film offers little in the way of a cohesive, relatable story. Instead, it places all its bets on a distinct visual style and quirky teenage dialogue, my favorite line being, “Dude, it’s a vagina, not a bowl of spaghetti.”
The characters are always dressed in Skittle rainbow colors and washed by golden light in daytime and blue tones at night. There are also lots of hazy dream sequences and pointless transition effects between scenes. Visual effects are used liberally depicting supernatural powers, and are pretty cheesy in my opinion.
Donnie Darko pulled off a similar aesthetic and story back in 2001, but this film is no Donnie Darko.
I do think Kaboom was a worthwhile movie to make. It pushes the boundaries of traditional film making with distinctive writing and visuals. Unfortunately, it is mostly a case of style over substance. There were a few interesting moments, but I doubt most viewers will leave the theater happy. The term, “noble failure” comes to mind. I give Kaboom a D+.
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